


Tempered courage (a remix)

by Lilliburlero



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Boarding School, M/M, Remix, Spanking, Triple Drabble, World War I
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-27
Updated: 2017-05-27
Packaged: 2018-11-05 08:09:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11009406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lilliburlero/pseuds/Lilliburlero
Summary: A remix of havisham's'a temper isn't courage', in an English public school setting.





	Tempered courage (a remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [havisham](https://archiveofourown.org/users/havisham/gifts).
  * Inspired by [a temper isn't courage](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10580832) by [havisham](https://archiveofourown.org/users/havisham/pseuds/havisham). 



Macmaster was insufferable. Vainglorious, conceited, melodramatic. He could be amusing, of course, about his peculiar upbringing in a crumbling Morayshire towerhouse, sans staff, sans running water, sans electricity, sans everything. And looking back on it, one would have to say his family circumstances were quite tragic. But he was hardly the only orphan in the school, nor even the only one who rather keenly felt the loss of his mother. The mystery was why de Clare tolerated him—well, no, it wasn’t a mystery, but it transgressed unspoken rules of conduct flagrantly enough to be considered unspeakable.

Matters came to a head when de Clare gave him a whacking in the Prefects’ Room, in front of us all. In theory, fifth-formers were not exempt from beatings, and Macmaster’s offence was sufficiently reprehensible to warrant public chastisement. In practice, however, it was unheard of. The retrospective opinion among those antiquarians who made a study of school _mores_ was that strict protocol demanded each prefect should administer a cut, and since there were twelve of us, including Ross, a son of the manse who was inclined to take Macmaster’s affectations as both a personal and a national affront, de Clare’s five strokes were a tender mercy indeed. 

But the look that passed between them, as de Clare took up his cigarette case (smoking, as long as it was done outdoors, being a privilege allowed those who had passed the Army Preliminary and were destined for Sandhurst the next spring) and made for the french window, was not a look easy to forget, a look smouldering, hilarious and triumphant at once. Oh, I fear, dear boy, these foolish stories traduce noble men. De Clare fell in the assault on Beaumont Hammel; Macmaster in Salonika, I believe. We shall not see their like again.


End file.
